Connected
by phoenixfire53
Summary: Three separated friends, all unhappy with their lives and jobs, are given the chance to go back in time to find a better purpose. When this means fighting in World War II with Easy Company, they must band together to survive and win.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **To all you awesome people reading this, YO!!! Thanks a bunch for reading!! It really means a lot to me!!!!! :D

**Title: **Connected

**Summary: **Three separated friends, all unhappy and miserable with their lives and jobs, are given the chance to travel back in time to find a better purpose for themselves. When they realize that finding a better purpose means fighting in World War II with Easy Company, the famous parachute infantry, they must band together to survive.

**Rating: **PG-13, I suppose. I honestly have no clue, so I'll probably figure that sheisse out as this baby goes along.

**Disclaimer: **I own a pair of Ray-Ban aviators. Best shades on the effing planet. :]

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for (or not)…..FANFIC TIME!!! (does thing and pulls a spastic happy dance) Read, then review! REVIEWS ARE POWER!!!!!

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_Tasha's P.O.V._

Hot, bitter sand swirled around me and suffocated me as I forced my way through yet another never-ending sandstorm. It stung my eyes, and caked my already-dry throat with dust. I hated Iraq, and the fact that there was nothing but sand as far the eye could fucking see.

"Captain O' Reilly! We got tangos at twelve o'clock!" one of my men shouted over the loud, gritty whistle of the wind.

Even though I could barely see through the sand, I could definitely hear them; guns firing randomly, awkward Arabic babbling…..they were there, all right.

"GET READY!" I shoved a fresh ammo clip into the AK-47 I clutched in my hands. "Let's give these towelheads some American whoop-ass!"

It became easier to hear the enemies' voices, which meant that they were getting closer to me and the rest of my battery. I crouched down behind a half-crumbled stone wall, and silently waited for the men behind me to replace their ammo clips.

"On your command, Captain!"

_Let's do this._

"Lock n' load, boys! Here they come!"

The towelheads suddenly opened fire and started screaming foreign death threats at us. We quickly returned the favor.

"GO GO GO!"

The entire battery charged forward, and proceeded to take down the Iraqi soldiers that were blindly shooting at us. For a few minutes, all anyone heard was the _rat-tat-tat _of AK-47's and the occasional frag grenade exploding. Then, the sound of my men shouting at me got thrown into the mix.

"TANGO DOWN!!" somebody would shout after forcing a death cry from a towelhead.

This went on for about ten minutes, finally ending when I couldn't hear "Tango down" or some Iraqi passionately raging in Arabic. By the time that was over, the sandstorm had also ended.

After wiping away the dust and sand covering my face and peeking around the wall to make sure somebody wasn't gonna jump out and shoot me, I looked at the dozens of dead, scarecrow-like Iraqis in their black robes and headscarves. I sighed, not really understanding why they chose to wear black in this heat.

_Weirdass people. _

"Any casualties?"

"Negative, Captain," a lieutenant responded.

I rolled my eyes. "What did I tell you 'bout calling me captain?"

The lieutenant didn't say anything. I rolled my eyes again, then turned to face him.

"Look, unless we're in combat, you call me Tasha. No exceptions."

He nodded at once. "Yes ma'am!" he barked curtly.

"Good. Now reload your gun. Battery's moving out in five."

Relieved that the killing was over for now, I leaned against the wall, and closed my eyes. After some time, all the drama over killing towelheads because they caused 9/11 became too much to endure, in my opinion. Yeah, what they did was stupid as hell and mind-numbingly horrible, but everybody made too much of big deal out of it. Towelheads did their thing randomly....their scare-tactics were never really planned ahead. It was always, _I have a great idea! Let's bomb the twin towers and scare the hell out of America! _Their terrorism shit was last minute, every single time.

"There has to be SOMETHING better than this," I whispered to myself.

The sound of a bird screeching shrilly made me open my eyes. I was a little surprised when I saw a large bald eagle perching on a rock in front of me.

"You're a little far from home, aren't you?"

The eagle seemed to shrug. "You could say that," it said in a boyish human voice.

_Okay. I think the heat's getting to me now. That eagle did NOT just talk to me. _

"On the contrary, I did." The bird flew off the rock and on the shoulder that wasn't housing my frag grenades and ammo clips. "I've heard your thoughts, Tasha O' Reilly. You're tired of fighting against a desireless enemy, aren't you?"

That creeped me out a little. "Um, yeah....I guess I am." I sighed sadly. "I get so goddamn tired of fighting against an enemy that only wants to watch us live in terror. They don't have a cause anymore."

The eagle cocked it's head curiously. "Go on," it urged.

"Quite honestly, I'd rather live in a different time period and fight someone that plans ahead." My thoughts immediately went to Adolf Hitler and World War II. "I'd rather fight someone like in the old days."

"I can make that possible."

"No, you can't," I said. "You're an eagle."

"You will find that there is more to me than what you see." The eagle suddenly unfurled it's wings, and stared into my eyes deeply. "You will have your wish, Tasha O' Reilly."

It then looked at the sky, and screeched. We were instantly surrounded by a blinding white light, and it felt like we were floating in the air. The feeling didn't last long for me though.

"Goodbye, life."

Then, I blacked out.

* * *

_A.J.'s P.O.V._

"Pass it here! Pass it here!" I yelled to the right winger on my line as I banged my stick on the ice. "I'm wide open for a pass, dammit!"

The winger fired the puck towards me (finally), and it bounced off the blad of my stick; I quickly regained control of it, skated up the ice, then hit a hard five-hole slapshot from the blue line. The puck screamed through the air, and sailed right between the goalie's pads without him noticing.

I grinned as my team celebrated my goal on the bench. _Perfect aim. No wonder West Point trained me to be a sniper. _

"Hey Gretzky!" my coach shouted from the bench. "Let's go! We've still got thirty seconds left!"

Embarrassed, I skated to the middle, and finished off the last thirty seconds of the game. Then, as soon as the buzzer went off, I skated off the ice, changed out of my gear, and got out of the rink as fast as I could.

I didn't leave though; instead, I set my bag down on the steps, sat on the railing, and looked up at the stars in silent wonder. There were dozens of them out tonight.....just looking at them made me feel like I was back in Europe for a special ops mission.

"See ya later, Anna," somebody from my team said as they walked to their car.

"It's A.J., remember?" I hated my full name - Anna Jane Stevenson. It was a too sweet for a soldier like myself. Being called Anna Jane was almost as bad as knowing that I wasn't on duty until December, and that I was stuck waiting for six months until then.

That was the other thing I hated. I loved being in combat - the rush of adrenaline, the explosion of a grenade in the distance......I loved it all. It really pissed me off when the military decided to give me a break from fighting for a while.

"Oh man, I'd kill to be in combat again."

"I can make that happen," a guy on my right said.

My head whipped to the side, and I was a little weirded out when I saw a bald eagle perched on the railing, smiling easy-as-you-please.

"Did you just talk?"

"I did." The eagle hopped from one foot to the other. "Are you happy, A.J. Stevenson?"

_Okay. I'm officially creeped out that this bird knows my name. _

I closed my eyes. "No, I'm not. It's June, and I'm not on duty until December. So I'm stuck in Illinois, doing nothing but playing hockey and going to shooting ranges."

"You're a soldier, I'm assuming?"

"Damn right I'm a soldier," I smirked. "I'm a sniper for the Marines, fresh outta West Point."

The eagle suddenly hopped on my shoulder, and stared at me. "How would you like to be on duty again?"

My heart skipped a couple beats when the eagle said that. "Are you kidding me? I'D KILL TO BE ON DUTY AGAIN!"

"Well then, you shall be on duty again." The bird screeched, and we were suddenly surrounded by blinding white light.

My heart swelled with happiness. I was going to be a soldier again. I was going to be a sniper again!

"YEE-HAW!!" I cheered ecstatically.

* * *

_Cory's P.O.V._

It was always the same thing everyday - drug addicts and depressed trainwrecks in and out of intensive care like people in an elevator. There were always a dozen or so that were checked in to Mass. General for being stupid beyond belief with dope or crack and for being screwed-up enough to attempt suicide. And of course, I was the "lucky" bitch that got to drag them around on a short leash and take extra special care of them in their fragile states.

"Corynne! We've got a crack addict hemorrhaging blood!"

I glared at the nurse calling for me irritably before we rushed off to keep this guy from bleeding out. "Internal or external?" I asked curtly.

The nurse, a tiny woman with a shoulder-length blonde bob, looked at me uneasily before she whispered, "Internal."

"O.R. NOW," I barked. "We need to stop the bleeding."

"If we move him, it might speed up-"

"This guy is gonna pass out and CODE if we don't put him on a gurney and get him to the O.R. Give him some anasthetic, and stop the hemorrhaging before he fucking bleeds out!"

Being a smart woman and really not wanting to piss me off anymore, the nurse bolted down the hall, then came running back up and off to the O.R. with the crack addict in tow.

I sighed, and ran my fingers through my hair once the nurse was out of sight. It was exasperating for me to have to deal with this b.s. on a daily basis.

_God...I need to get outta here. _

Thankful that nobody was running down the hall and telling that yet another patient was having problems, I shuffled out of the intensive care unit, and made my way to the records archives. It was the one place I could be where I didn't have to deal with melodramatic depression patients or brainless drug addicts.

Once I was in the archives, I leaned against the wall, and closed my eyes.

"Finally...some alone time," I breathed.

"I wouldn't call it alone time, Cory. It's more of a break time for pissed-off staff members." One of the doctors - and also my best guy buddy, Brian - from the E.R. unit emerged from behind a shelf that held nothing but file folders and empty Starbucks cups, and chuckled softly.

"Don't you have a job to do, Brian?"

Brian raised one of his dark brown eyebrows. "Don't you, too? What are you doing in here?"

"Escaping the druggies and nurses," I groaned. "Why the hell did the government give me a babysitting job with addicts and depression patients?"

He half-smiled sympathetically at me. "You needed an easier job after you broke your neck in Iraq, remember?"

My mind flashed back to when I broke my neck in a humvee crash, and was shipped home to "take it easy," according to my battery commander. The day I was shipped back, my life, and the chance of ever being an army medic again seemed to vanish in a second.

"Brian, I was a medic. Medics are bound to get hurt sooner or later."

"You were a medic with a broken neck. The army wasn't gonna let you run around and almost get yourself killed again."

The same empty, angry feeling I got when my battery commander told me I was being shipped back to the U.S. welled up inside me, and I snapped all of a sudden.

"Tough shit for the army! I would've stayed and gone against orders!" I balled my hands into tight fists as the anger seeped deeper into me. "I wouldn't have given a damn if I was a woman or if I was risking breaking my neck again! I would've stayed!"

Brian took a hesitant step towards me, his arms outstretched and his face deeply etched with worry. "Cory? You wanna-"

"No Brian! Back the hell away from me!" I snarled. I then kicked the archives door open, and stormed out.

"Cory, please!"

"NO! I'm getting outta here and I'm going back to the army! Don't try to stop me!"

Then, I left the dozens of people that had been listening to stare suspiciously at Brian, and ran out the back entrance of the hospital. I didn't care if anybody said anything about me. I had to get away from this place before it drove me insane.

I finally stopped in the far end of the staff parking lot, rested against a tree, and stared helplessly at the hospital.

_There has to be SOMETHING better than this. _

A sudden screech from right above interrupted my thoughts. Annoyed that it was damn near impossible for me to have some peace of mind, I glanced up, and found myself staring directly at a bald eagle. A BIG bald eagle.

"Well, hell-o. What brings you here?" I asked curiously. I then realized what I just did, and mentally kicked myself for being stupid enough to talk to an eagle.

"You can't understand a word I'm saying, and you can't talk to me, so I guess I'm good."

"Actually, I can understand everything you're saying to me, and I can talk," the eagle retorted in an unnaturally human voice.

I nearly fell on my ass the second that bird talked to me. I gawked at it in awestruck shock, and croaked, "Y-you talk!"

"Yes, I do." The eagle readjusted it's large brown wings, and gave me an impatient look. "Only to certain people, though."

I clenched my eyes shut, and rested the palms of my hands on my forehead.

"I'm losing my mind now," I moaned. "I shouldn't be talking to you at all....I should be taking care of drug addicts and making sure they aren't getting stoned or high."

"You're unhappy."

"No, I'm not...I've got a good job that pays a lot. Happy as a fucking clam."

The eagle looked at me emotionlessly. "I've watched and listened to you, Corynne Fliescher. You'd rather be an army medic than a doctor to drug addicts."

_Jesus Christ, how the hell does this bird know these things?_

"You would know," I mumbled.

"I DO know!"

"Well, what could you possibly do? I'm a human, you're a bird. I don't think you can do much except talk and all that crap an eagle does."

"Oh, I can do MUCH more than that." The eagle suddenly spread it's massive wings, and gazed at me confidently. "Do you want to be a medic again, Corynne Fliescher?"

I found myself saying "yes" as I stared at the bird. Right now, there was nothing I wanted more than to be a medic. I would've done ANYTHING to do it again.

"I want to be a medic again," I said softly.

"Very well, then," the eagle nodded as it hopped out of the tree and on to my shoulder. "You shall be a medic again."

It looked up at the sky, and let loose another screech that seemed to echo for a long time. For a few seconds, nothing happened. Then, it was like all hell broke loose; I felt my body being lifted up, and I was surrounded by a painfully white light.

_HOLY SHIT!!!!!_

"What the hell's happening!" I screamed in terror.

The eagle simply grinned at me, screeched a third time, and suddenly hurtled through the air, with me following behind.

"HANG ON!!" I heard the eagle shout from not too far away.

"WHAT?! THERE'S NOTHING _TO _HANG ON TO, IN CASE YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY NOTICED!!"

"HANG ON FOR DEAR LIFE!! WE'RE COMING IN HARD!!"

I opened my mouth, and was about to say something, but sudden impact knocked the words - and the wind - right out of me. My body slammed into a dry dirt ground, and left a large crater there.

I felt dizzy and weak; my head was pounding, and I felt like I was being crushed with one-ton boulders. I weakly called out for help, then blacked out.


	2. Wake Up

**Author's Note: **Shizamsky people!! Chapter numero deux is UP!!! :D Hope y'all enjoy it!!

**Disclaimer: **I own the cooliest hockey t-shirt ever. :] I don't own Band of Brothers, and I don't mean to offend anyone.

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_A.J.'s P.O.V._

"Jesus, she looks awful."

"Yeah, like I didn't already fuckin' know that, Toye. Eesh..."

"Bill, save it for the Germans, will ya?"

My head was swimming as I listened to the voices throwing insults and curses back and forth at each other. It seriously felt like somebody had taken a rifle, and bashed my skull with the back of it. If you're wondering how I know what that would feel like, well, it's happened to me before. I'm a soldier, remember? Shit like that's supposed to happen to me at some point.

"Save _WHAT _for the Germans?" I mumbled.

I heard feet shuffling like crazy as soon as I said that. "Hey! I think she's wakin' up, Joe!"

_Gee, you think so?_

I sat up as a wave of red-hot pain washed over me, and stared groggily out my half-open eyes at...._Frank John Hughes? Kirk Avecedo?_

Feelings of pain completely forgotten, I jerked my head from side to side, trying to figure out where I was at the moment.

"Ma'am, what's wrong?" Frank asked cautiously.

I looked at the both of them bewilderingly, then I shook my head.

"Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa. Can somebody_ PLEASE _tell me what the hell is going on here, because last time I checked, you two hadn't worn monkey suits or called each other Bill or Joe since 2001," I babbled skittishly.

Both actors looked at each other nervously, and bit their lips in unison. Frank then turned to me. "Are you all right?"

"NO, I'm NOT all right. I don't know who you people are, I don't know where I am. Dammit, I don't even know what year it is right now!"

"Well then, guess we'll just fill you in, huh?" Kirk half-smiled. "Name's Joe Toye, and this knucklehead over here's Bill Guarnere."

_Oh shit, I've got BAD feeling about where this is going._

"This here place is Aldbourne, England, and it's 1944 right now."

_You have GOT to be kidding. _

"So, you got a name, honey?" 'Bill' asked curiously.

_Might as well make the best of it. _

"Yeah." I rubbed my head gingerly. "Name's Anna Jane Stevenson, but it's A.J. and nothing but, got it?"

"Ain't A.J. a guy's name?"

I nodded. "Exactly why I have people call me that." I pointed at myself, and smirked. "I'm a sniper in the U.S. Marines, not some airheaded cheerleader that wants to sound cool."

"A.J. it is, then....so - "

"HEY JOE! YOUR LITTLE FRIEND AWAKE YET?!" somebody shouted. "THE OTHERS WANNA KNOW IF SHE'S ALL RIGHT!"

I looked at Bill and Joe strangely. "What others?"

"The other two chicks we found. They wanna know if you're okay," Joe explained.

"Who's THEY? Can I get some names before I smack somebody?"

Joe gave Bill a question mark look before saying, "What _were _their names?"

"Well, what the fuck are ya lookin' at me for? I only know one of 'em's named Cory. The other's name starts with a T - Tara, or Tricia or Tasha. Somethin' like that."

_NO WAY!! _

I immediately vaulted off the ground, and raced over to a larger group of people that was no doubt crowding around Tasha and Cory. I had to see for myself that they were actually here.

"MOVE!" I commanded impatiently. I shoved my way through the thin wall of soldiers, until I was standing in front of two women.

My mouth started opening and closing like a fish the second I laid my eyes on them. Red-headed Tasha was staring at me with her mouth gaping open, and Cory, the chick with black hair that practically reached down to her ass, was stuttering and pointing at me.

"A.J?! How the - "

Tasha didn't get the chance to finish what she was saying before I had her and Cory in a crushing bearhug.

"A.J! A.J! Can't breathe!" Tasha croaked.

I instantly let go of her and Cory, and beamed at them excitedly.

"My god, it's so good to see you guys! It's been, like, ages - "

"Dammit A.J, can you shut up for ONE second?" Cory snapped as she gave me an irritated glare. "How's your head feeling?"

"Just peachy. What's got you all freaked out, huh?"

"Ahem, I'm a medic, remember?"

"O-kay." I rolled my eyes. "So, is my head all you're worried about, or do I have another round of shit headed my way?"

"Better brace yourself, A.J. You've got another thing coming," Tasha sighed boredly.

"Tasha, can it. Now, how the hell did you get here?"

_Ha, there's NO WAY she'll believe what I'm gonna tell her. _

"You're gonna think I'm crazy after you hear this."

Cory groaned in frustration. "For fuck's sake A.J, spit it out already!"

"All right! All right! All right! Eesh!" I ran my fingers through my hair and sighed, trying to remember what had happened before I woke up in Aldbourne. "I was having a pissy moment about not being on duty 'til December when the bird came."

"Wait a sec, _the bird?_" Cory gave me a funny look. "Was it big bald eagle?"

"Yeah, it was....it asked me if I wanted to be on duty again. I said yes, and now here I am." I pursed my lips, and looked at the sky. "I'd been thinking that there had to be something better for me than sitting around before the eagle appeared."

Tasha suddenly gasped. I turned to look at her, and I saw shock bloom in her dark green eyes. "A.J, Cory, look behind you."

We did, and we gasped too; there, sitting on top of one of the army tents, was the eagle, smiling like watching us freak out was the funniest damn thing on the planet.

_What the fuck are you smiling at, you retarded bird?_

"Could you excuse us for a moment?" Tasha smiled sweetly at the crowd of soldiers surrounding us. "We need to get things figured out really quickly."

She then grabbed mine and Cory's hands, and started to yank us towards the eagle in a very pissed-off way. I gulped; having to watch Tasha when she was angry was never pretty.

"Hey Tasha, before you go ballistic on the eagle, do us a solid and try not to destroy everything in sight."

"No guarantees," she hissed through her teeth. "That walking pile of feathers has answers, and I want them NOW."

I shook my head, and prayed that she wasn't going to unleash Armageddon while she got her _answers._

* * *

_Tasha's P.O.V._

To say that I was pissed-off beyond belief was like saying that Paris Hilton had an I.Q. of negative fifty - long story short, I was fucking FURIOUS.

I stomped over to the tent the bird was perching on, and jabbed my finger at it's chest. "What are you all smiley about?"

That retarded feather mass smiled at me, obviously amused by the bout of anger I was having. "I see we're very unhappy at the moment. Do tell me, what _EVER _is the matter, Tasha?"

"Don't fucking play games with me, you son-of-a-bitch harpy!" I grabbed the eagle by the feet, and brought it's beaky face extremely close to mine. "I am seriously fifteen seconds away from pulling out a gun and putting a hole in you, so unless you want to be a smartass and get shot, you'd better start giving me answers NOW!" I snarled.

"Oh, must I explain this to you?" the bird sighed. "You _WANTED _to fight somebody that actually planned ahead and thought things out, and what better enemy to fight than Adolf Hitler and his Nazi army?"

I tightened my grip on it's talons. "That doesn't tell me much. You're down to ten seconds now." I bared my teeth at it. "Explain to me why the hell I'm standing in Aldbourne with a bunch of clueless actors instead of the real-deal Easy soldiers before I make things get ugly."

"Tasha Tasha Tasha...these men _ARE _the real Easy Company paratroopers. They look like the actors because I made them that way."

"Made them that way?" A.J. said in a puzzled voice.

"Yes. It makes it easier to identify who is who, of course." It tried to wriggle it's feet free of my grip. "Could you let go of me now? You're going to bruise my legs."

"You still haven't told me why I'm standing in sixty-year old England with the fucking Band of Brothers cast instead of someplace with a LIVING enemy and UP-TO-DATE technology. You've got five seconds now, so I wouldn't push my luck, if I were you."

"Tasha, just let it go! It already told you, anyway!" Cory said in an annoyed voice.

"Cory, all the thing's been doing so far is acting like a smartass. It hasn't told me anything, and I'm not letting go until it does."

"First of all, I'm a _he, _not an _it._ Second of all, I was _GOING _to tell you why you and your friends are here, but you aren't giving me a chance with your interrupting." 'He' gave me an irritated glare before he went on. "Fighting in this war with these men will fufill all of your wishes - Tasha will be fighting against a strategic enemy, A.J. will be in combat, and Cory will be an army medic. Don't you see the logic now? It's the perfect event that will grant you happiness and allow you to build a better purpose for yourselves."

_Huh. Never thought about that._

Like he'd just read my thoughts, the eagle said, "Most people never bring that into consideration. It's a normal thing."

"Can you stop that?! The last thing I need is a wiseass bird reading my thoughts like a goddamn book!" I snapped.

"All right, I'll stop reading your minds." He sighed boredly. "Why must you take the fun out of everything?"

"I don't wanna seem like a wingnut, that's why." I let go of his talons, and crossed my arms in front of my chest. "Now, how the hell are we supposed to do this?"

The eagle shrugged in a no-big-deal way. "Become a soldier. Simple."

I rolled my eyes. "EXPLAIN how we're supposed to do this. You're pissing me off with the zero-info bullshit."

"I find it amazing that someone like you is a captain in the army," he snorted. "Use that imagination-absent brain of yours! Think like a soldier, talk like a soldier, BECOME A SOLDIER!"

"Jesus Christ bird, I get it!" I barked impatiently.

"My GOD, do you have to be so derogatory?" He rubbed the tips of his wings against his temples like the name _bird _gave him a migraine. "You _CAN _give me a name, you know."

"Later. We don't have time for the christening crap, 'kay? We need to figure out how to pull this off...."

A.J.'s face suddenly lit up. "I'll be right back," she smirked. Then, she ran off into a large group of men walking towards us, and disappeared.

As soon as A.J. was gone, Cory looked at me strangely. "What the fuck's up with A.J?"

"Dunno." I shrugged and sighed. "Better hope she comes back though."

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YAY!! FINISHED!!! Sorry that this wasn't up as soon as I thought it would be. But anyway, R&R!!!!


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